Opinion

By Beauttah Omanga | Jul. 02, 2024

Speaker of National Assembly Moses Wetangula failed Kenyans big time when he had an excellent opportunity to save the nation from the Tuesday chaos that claimed lives and left massive damage.

Wetangula had a lifetime chance to go into history by making a simple but impactful Solomonic judgment that would have halted the chaos witnessed in the country like never before.

By the time the contentious 2024-2025 Finance Bill vote was taken, tension was already building across the country.

One would have expected the speaker, even without consulting anybody, to suspend the debate, and order the people's representatives to ventilate on the countrywide demonstrations. 

I am sure even MPs in the house were aware of what was happening in their home towns through social media courtesy of their mobile phones.

Assuming the speaker was blind and deaf as the house rules dictate, why didn't the MPs themselves defuse the tension that was building across the country in respect to what they were debating?

While I join the president, the church, former President Uhuru Kenyatta and the opposition under the leadership of Raila Odinga and Kalonzo Musyoka in condemning the aftermath of the dark day, I fully blame the august House for letting Kenyans down.

TV sets

The speaker being leader of one of the three arms of government should have done better.

Assuming again that while he was chairing the session, he might have not really seen or grasped the tension outside the Chambers. 

Fair enough. When he moved the house to the committee of the whole, which is chaired by the deputy speaker, Wetangula retreated to his Chambers.

Inside his Chambers, huge TV sets are fitted and I am sure all of them were on and streaming live the chaos from many parts of the country.

One would have expected him to either summon the house leadership for urgent consultations with a view of suspending the vote just to calm the nation. 

He should have simply walked back to the debating Chambers and guided the house to debate the chaos related to what they were deliberating. 

If he did this, I am convinced the rage with which the protestors reacted on learning that the the MPs had ignored their demands for the suspension of finance bill and voted overwhelmingly for its adoption in a record time would have reduced.

With the vote having been taken, majority of Kenyans, I included, felt cheated. The ball then was passed to the presidents court who, Kenyans felt, should stand with them.

Luckily, protests by Gen Z compelled the the president not to sign it into law. He returned the bill to the house for further action. 

Mr Speaker, Kenya as we found it, has been an epitome of peace in the region and you have an obligation of retaining it there by listening and acting according to the wishes of the church and majority of Kenyans. 

For failing to act to save and protect the integrity of the house, Moses Wetangula should simply resign. 

 Mr Omanga is a media practitioner